>>33069579
>towards the blinking red light
The vending machine is probably a huge monster like the faceblocks. blinking red light might be a bit less likely to kill us.

>>33069860

There ya are, grabbing more coffee and then we can get back to mindfucks

>>33069579
>Towards the forlorn blinking red light in the distance behind
Sure, I'll back this.

>>33069924
I actually lurked through last session, but this shit's the good kind of fucked up so I'll hang around at least until more people show up.

>>33069579
>>Towards the feeble glow of lamplight ahead, and what looks like a vending machine.
Let's have a drink

>>33069579
>Vending machine
Vending machines are nice and familiar, I like nice and familiar. Let's not go to a mysterious fucking blinking light of unknown provenance.

>a tie

Goddammit

>>33070070
At least it means you got four participants?

Dunno if OP planned this, but yesterday was the 10th anniversary of yume nikki being created/released. pretty weird thinking it was released that long ago.

>Vending Machine
let's not blatantly metagame, guys.

Towards the feeble glow of lamplight ahead, and what looks like a vending machine.

>>33070098
I've never player Yume Nikki, though I know of it.

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>>33070098
>theme: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APufCfeIImM

Standing in the middle of the road, with Things moving through the trees, you ponder your options.

Ahead is Light. And Light is good. Right now you like Light, and you really want more Light. In fact you want a flamethrower and a few molotov cocktails. But...

... there's also the face-cube incident. Stone cubes. With faces on them. Who knows, the vending machine could come to life and kill you, like that one haunted one in that Stephen King story. You think it was haunted.

"Aw, hell," you say aloud to nobody in particular. Light. You know your lizard brain is screaming and gibbering like the primal, frightened child it is, but you don't give a shit. Right now, you need LIGHT. And at least, if the vending machine tries to eat you, you'll see the sumbitch coming. You heft the axe in your hands to reassure yourself, shoulder it, and continue on.

As your sneakers squelch along the blacktop, something colorful begins to move against the dark trees. Keeping your head fixed dead ahead, still squelching forward bravely, you strain your eyes in their sockets to glimpse them.

Butterflies, they are, rising from the earth, colorful and varied, symmetrical patterns on their wings... and every one of them as large as a man.

>>33070150
putting it in spoilers so as not to influence anything.

the blinking light is probably the stop light effect - it gives us time-slowing/stopping power powers.

>>33070236
Oh the pretty colors!

>>33070236

You stop cold, wiping the rain from your eyes, and stare at them as they seemingly rise from the earth and float upwards, antennae waving lazily as they ascend. Their patterns aren't anything you can remember, but they're all spectacular, all of them sporting the "false eyes" common to many species.

The cicadas are humming again, buzzing away like madmen, the thrum in the wet air seeming to tingle and vibrate along your skin. You stand there, silent, as you watch the first pretty thing you've found in this dreary, dark nightmare you've slipped into.

And then the false eyes blink.

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>>33070304

You jerk to attention, the axe swinging off your shoulder before you realize you've moved. The false eyes are too *wet,* some of the ones further along gleaming in the meager, dampened light of the sad little lamp-post, and as you watch, their pupils move to focus on you.

Some lizard-brain instinct bids you look up - to see, barely visible as black silhouettes against an almost-black, starless sky - a flock of the man-sized insects diving towards you.

You look away, not trusting your mind to gaze upon it any longer, and fix your sight on the distant lamp-post, so inviting and so very, very, very, far away.

>RUN
>FIGHT
>ITEM

>>33070397
>>RUN
We can't stop here, this is bat county.

>>33070397
>ITEM
If we fight we'll die, if we run we'll die tired. Let's see what deus ex machine we can conjure up to get us out of this one.

>>33070397
>FIGHT
Yeah!

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>>33070517
yuh cheeky git

>>33070397

AGAIN. WHY MUST YOU DESTROY MY RESTFUL SLEEP AGAIN WITH THESE NIGHTMARES? WHY?!?!

>RUN

...Anyway, please proceed.

>>33070397
>RUN

>>33070538
Hi feggit. I've been refreshing the catalog entire day and ctrl+f 'ing for yume nikki ;_;

>>33070673
catalog has a search too, no need to Ctrl+F

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>>33070517
>>33070494
>>33070460

You never remember making a conscious decision one way or another - you just *go.*

Your sneakers clap against the wet blacktop, the sound vanishing into the buzzing hum of cicada-song as you run for your miserable life. Above you can barely hear the silibant whisper of wind over insectile wings, and you know they're arrowing in to attack you, like diving hawks.

You dive off the roadway, hitting the soggy earth with your shoulder and rolling headfirst to spring up on your feet again as a crackle-WHUMPH! sounds behind you, the dry scritchy rustling of wings in a flurry like moths on your window screen at night and now more, more MORE crack-whumps in the earth behind you as you fling yourself into another forward roll, huge exoskeletons slamming into the earth on all sides of you, their owners flailing about in a colorful frenzy of frantic wings, the eyeballs, they eyes the fucking EYES all rolling about to find you, they're looking for you with their wings they've eyes, they've eyes everywhere and you squeeze your own shut and listen with all your might for that silibant whisper of diving death and you RUN

FOR

YOUR

FUCKING

LIFE

and slam right into a tree.

>>33070771
Ow.

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>>33070771

You roll to your axe immediately, shoving the splitting pain in your skull aside with terror and adrenaline and force of will. Springing to your feet and pressing your back against a tree, you espy shadows moving over the long, wild grass between you and the dark road.

They can't dive on you with the trees in the way, as you'd hoped - but now they advance on foot. You ready your axe in one hand as the bright colors of the eye-wing-human-sized "butterflies" become apparent in the darkness, brighter and more vivid as they close in upon you.

>I can outpace them on the ground!
>I make my stand here!
>Fuck this, innawoods we go

>>33070880
Not sure what's the difference between first and third option, but;
>Fuck this, innawoods we go

Frog help us.

>>33070880

>I make my stand here!

Fuck this noise. Violence solves all problems.

>>33070880
>>Fuck this, innawoods we go
Going by earlier descriptions, there's way too many of them for us to handle. Besides, if you die in the Matrix, you die for real!

>>33070880
>I can outpace them on the ground!
I'm sure of it!

>>33070880
>Fuck this, innawoods we go
As always, every option has its own promise of terrifying horrors lurking around every corner, which is to say they all suck. But the insect things are right there in front of us, while whatever the fuck awaits us in the forest isn't, and instinct demands we run away from the most immediate terror.

>>33071164
Plus, we have an axe, which forests have an elemental weakness to.

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>>33071016
>>33070967
>>33070947
>>33070943

The first hellfly closes in, its long, segmented antenna thrashing and whipping in your direction with disturbing eagerness. You meet its charge with a backhand swing, the spiked side of your axehead punching through its head with no trouble, pinning it to the pungent earth. It spasms madly, the bright colors of its wings shining and shifting as the eyes roll about wildly and weep neon tears.

"GATORAAAAADE" you scream madly, yanking the axe out and meeting the next butterman with a kick that caves in its skull, the antennae beating meatily against your legs and thighs in its death throes. The rest close in, and you wind up with your axe, a mad heat searing your lungs, the chill and wet seeming to roll off your skin as your muscles catch fire.

Some rational part of your mind calls out to you just before you wade into their midst, bids you check the scene again, always check again, it whispers - and as you glance askance you witness more of them closing on the flanks.

They're trying to surround you.

With a cry of what? you twirl and clear the nearest one with a long leap, your feet crashing through the bushes and dead sticks in the forest proper. Behind you the creatures pause, their antennae waving furiously as they raise their wings and turn sideways to regard you with their wing-eyes, the dark forest lit with the flashing dancing light of their animated neon wings.

>>33071265
>"GATORAAAAADE"
I think she's confused some words with each other...

>>33071265
>"GATORAAAAADE" you scream madly
THAT's our battlecry? Jesus. No wonder our subconscious is so fucked up.

>>33071265
>Behind you the creatures pause, their antennae waving furiously
angry_moth_noises.gif

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>>33071364
You called?

>>33071394
The funny thing is that actual angry moth noises are kind of cute. They're so squeaky. I'm sure it would be scary when it comes from a dozen giant moth monsters, though.

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>>33071318
>>33071313

"Glowing sweat-"

glowing tears glowing blood

"-use your body to fuel... sweet... ah, fuck, how'd that go again?"

The forest is Dark.

Scratch that.

The Forest is fucking *dark.*

You're effectively blind, the vague outlines of trees and branches dimly visible as solid shadows against a dark-grey background. You feel ahead with the axe-handle, the hollow *tick tock took* of the hickory shaft guiding you around trees and bushes as your wet jeans catch and drag through every bramble and bush. You're heading the right direction - towards the Light, parallel to the road, you think - but you know you've got know way of knowing, no fucking way at all. You'd be lucky to escape the Forest itself, now, much less find your way back.

But you're still alive, and for now, that's enough.

That's always the first step, isn't it?

Eventually you find a void space, where your axe handle probes, but cannot connect. You stand with your back against the bark of an unseen tree, straining your eyes into the perfect, blank void before you. Reaching down with the axe handle, you poke and prod, but discover no earth, no ground.

You stand on the rain-slick precipice of darkness, lost and alone.

>Probe
>Shout
>Wait

>>33071528
I would make a reference, but I never played that game.

>>33071528
>Shout
"Gabe! Tycho! Are you there?!"

>>33071528
>>Wait
Sit down
Try not to cry
Cry a lot

>>33071528
>Probe
Shouting will bring the attention of whatever *things* are out there, and waiting? We might as well wait for death for all the good that does.

>>33071528
With the lack of "Enter" option, go with "Probe".

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>>33071589

couldn't not use that line

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You pause, uncertain and afraid.

What if this is the furthest extent of your psyche? The very limits of your Id? One more step and you escape your mind entire, plummeting into the endless void of Limbo, lost to sense and sensation for all time. You'll die fifty years later on a ventilator, and they'll never, ever know what happened to you -

- you slam the door on that thinking so hard you can hear it bang through your mind, sharp punctuation to a blunt statement.

You're not giving up. You're NEVER giving up. There is always...

... the old pebble trick.

Stooping carefully, you brush your fingers across the earth till you find a decent-sized limb. Trying not to think of the creepy-crawly neon-monster-eye-centepides that stop fucking *thinking* about it asshole stop stop STOP-

- the branch goes flying out into the night, and below you can hear it rattle and thump as it rolls down a hillside.

You expel a breath you didn't know you were containing.

A hill.

Its just a damn hill.

You descend.

>>33071802
Yeah I think it was featured in previous thread too.

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>>33071736

Knees half-bent, axehandle dragging through the ground, you guide yourself through the pitch-black, now well and truly blind. But at least you're alone; bright neon seems to mark the buggies in this 'burg, so darkness is indeed your friend. Paul Simon, eat your -

- best not to use words like that, you think.

There's no trees, but short stubble crackles and snaps beneath your soaked sneakers, and the axehandle's end comes back feeling grainy and smeared. You sniff it - soot. The smell of smoke and charring is in the air now, stronger and stronger as you descend into the darkness.

"Night and day the dark gates stand wide..." you mutter. "Didn't see any gates. Put up a fence, buddy. Don't tell me you don't have some contractors down there."

Your voice echoes a little, rolling back on you, barely audible over the pattering rainfall. At length you stop, your thighs burning from the constant crouch, and fall back upon the steep hillside, resting for just a moment.

The rain stops.

>>33071851
>"Night and day the dark gates stand wide..."
Our MC seems rather cultured.

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Hey, wait, didn't we attach a crowbar to the axe? So the bottom of the handle isn't hickory, it's the metal curved end of a crowbar.

>>33071994
No? I don't think we even brought it along.

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>>33071851

Like a faucet shutting off, the rain just fucking stops. The silence descends like an anvil, as wet and heavy as the atmosphere after the rain. You look up into the black, apprehensive - without the trees, you're once again vulnerable from... anything.

Then quicksilver is born.

A bright dot of silverlight, expanding, growing two horns as it reaches out to encircle a black disc -

- the moon.

Made.

Manifest.

Columns of rising clouds rising? drift and twist over the sullen silver half-moon that you just watched *spawn* in the sky. Looking downwards you find the slope revealed, a long, steep, barren expanse vanishing into shadowed darkness at the bottom, of what you can only presume is a gulch. Twisting to look behind you, a dark summit rises to stab the (still) starless sky behind, seeming untouched and unconcerned with your personal moon.

You stand with a sigh, place both fists against your lower spine and lean back, the sharp crackling sounds echoing loudly in the sudden silence.

"Now what?" you ask.

"Now what," your voice echoes and fades downhill.

Wait.

The speed of sound - everyone knows that. 700MPH. A sharp snapping sound, from your fingers - in moist air you can hear that slap it makes as it meets a barn door or a hillside. You could measure the distance from here to gulch bottom easily.

Pointless, but the appeal of something logical and measurable is irritable. You turn to face down the hill, ready to shout -

- and then you see them.

Things that weren't there before.

Silver domes, glinting in the moonlight.

>Investigate?
>Pass Through?

>>33072100
>>Investigate
Because curiosity has mostly been rewarded with trouble so far.

>>33071994
I do remember us strapping the two together in such a way that the butt of the axe is the crowbar's hook.

>>33072100
>Investigate?
Against our better judgement, we shall examine the shiny things. Horrible things are going to happen to us no matter what we do, at least this way we'll have some causal connection to blame it on.

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>>33072158
>>33071994

You've put them together much like this (pic related,) with the forked end of the crowbar over the axe blade. The crowbar isn't long enough to reach all the way to the end of the axe handle, but almost, so the spot the hooked part is at perfectly sited to let you grasp the axe handle, and the crook of the crowbar serves as a "cup" to keep your hand from sliding too far down the axeshaft.

For serious and prolonged use, you'd want to unwire that and swing away, of course.

>>33072100
>Investigate
Everything here is seemingly meaningless and dangerous, but what the hell, let's give the domes a look.

(catching dinner, gimme 5)

>>33072100
this writing seriously kicks ass. reminds me of a poetry blog i used to read in high school: fittingly abstract and superfluous

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You scrabble down the hillside, fighting a sneeze as dust and ash drift into your nostrils. When you near the silver domes, you find them to be... little foil tents, of a sort, just long enough to contain a man, and crinkly like an unfolded space blanket.

They're laid out in a row, thirteen in all, and at the head of each, on the uphill slope, stands a little, charred cross.

Except for the one in the middle.

You creep closer, your sneakers crunching the charred stubble with painful volume. With the tip of the axe-spike, you gently slide it underneath the centermost... thing, and lift its light structure easily.

Underneath you discern the vague shadows of a body.

With a quick shove you fling the foil contraption away, letting the meager sickly silver moonlight fall full on the face.

Your head pounds violently as you stare at the man, panic and pain squeezing your heart, a mad gibbering sounding from somewhere nearby -

- you know him.

You know him.

You know him.

You know him.

you can't fucking remember who

and he'll hate you for it

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>>33072611
ok

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>>33072489

oh man I'm so glad, I usually don't write mindfuck like this

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>>33072611

>>33072672
No, man, you're doing an amazing job. I think we're all enjoying this a lot.

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>>33072611

You fall upon your knees, your weapons forgotten, and reach towards the man's face, tracing your fingers over the half-remembered contours. His eyes are half-open, his jaw slack, as if he died in pain, gasping for air. Something hurts within you, deep within, and you don't - can't know why, and that hurts all the more. Like a hobo crawling into a church and pawing uselessly at the feet of the Crucified Christ behind the altar, you stroke that cold, forgotten face, trying, trying to remember its grace.

Your meager vision blurs, and some broken sound escapes your shambled soul. Wiping a sleeve across your eyes, your other hand brushes those unseeing eyes closed.

"I'm sorry," you mutter. "I'm sorry. I can't remember."

"I'm sorry."

"EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGGGGGGGHHHHH," he replies.

>wut
>come again
>NOPE

>>33072787
>come again
I'm sorry, what was that?

>>33072787
>>NOPE
nopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenopenope

>>33072787
>come again

Normally, I would nope, but we seem to be in the middle of an emotional breakdown.

>>33072787
>NOPE
stand up immediately, take some steps back, and then
>come again?

You jerk away, terror racing down your spine, but something heavy in your chest roots your knees to earth. Two ice-cold, clammy hands seize your jacket and grip them with impossible strength, and then its too late. The glassy, dead eyes stare into yours as a horrible, throaty growl rips from the dead throat.

The face becomes mobile, dead slabs of meat twitching and squishing like a man waking from surgery to pain, and a keening, rattling wail escapes his throat.

"ai ahi ai ai ai ai ai ai aaiaia a- " someone is stuttering out far away, high-pitched little yips of mindless panic.

"Ueah," the body says, releasing your jacket with one hand and smashing it into the earth by his side, swiping the palm across the ground. He reaches for your face, and all you can do is watch that impossibly powerful, zombie hand close in on your eyes.

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>>33073002

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>>33073002

An ice-cold digit presses to your forehead, freezing your last breath in your lungs.

It drags down your face, towards your nose, then lifts.

Again, high above your right eye,

-and across your head.

And away.

"euuhh," he groans, little dribbles of ash weeping from his eyes, the dead-white skin around it crinkled with pain? as that free limb crosses his body to his shoulder. You shriek as a ripping sound rends the heavy, wet air, but nothing of yours is missing or rent oh god please let this end-

- its his hands clasp around one of yours with iron strength, tears springing to your eyes as the bones creak-

- and a squeeze, so gentle, so terribly cold -

"aaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh" the corpse sighs, and it drops dead once twice more.

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>>33073107
Take this one.

>>33073123
id be too horrified and confused to do anything for a while

>>33073123

...Did he just draw a cross on our forehead?

>>33073220
It seems it he did. Like, an X for "shoot here"?

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>>33073123

Spinning through the dark grabbing trees and billowing black fire, soot and death collapsing atop your aching shoulders as you and they and everything screams and screams and screams, hell blowing and tugging at your arms that circle down, down down as you come back to yourself.

Facedown in the twigs and rotting things, shivering uncontrollably, soaking wet clothes clinging to your flesh. An ache unbelievable in your head and chest, still fading, just enough to let you breathe.

Axe.

Crowbar?

Your irons, where are -

- here, in your hand. Can't feel your hand. Pry them loose, you shove with your chin and bite with your fingers until the hand (your hand) releases the shaft, and stuff it down your pants, between your thighs, praying it'll come back to oh *christ* yes there it is quite lively now why did you bite it what the *fuck!?*

Something in your other hand.

Small, flat, ragged, stitched. In the darkness you can't read it.

You look up, but the fickle moon has vanished once more. Of course, it only shines on that gulch and-

- a long way. A long way, you ran, you must've.

And through the scratching bare brambles yonder, the sallow weak glow of that fucking lamppost at last, very, very close.

>>33073123
So he's a Catholic zombie? What are we going to give up for Lent?

>>33069579
>not a oen shot any longer

called it

>>33073292

Evidently, he gave up living.

>>33073346
Q.E.D.

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>>33073283

The rain fades back into your conscious perception, heavy sheets of misery hammering you back into the earth, but *fuck* them. Brief snatches of sensation flit across your mind

- cold finger traces -

- mornful voice sighs -

- clasping hands gentle, death caresses -

- and away again.

"I've been through worse," you grunt. "C-catholic zombies? F-f-f-cuk y-y-yooouuuu, c-c-cube-t-tron was whussss-" you give it up and save your strength for levering yourself to your feet, your axeshaft sinking deep into the pungent forest floor as you rise. Staggering through the brambles, smashing and swiping at them irritably, you stagger towards your prize, at last - the lamp-post, solitary and brave, throwing back the hellish nightmare with burning light. Beneath it sits a bench.

And next to it is a vending machine.

And it sells beer.

>inspect new item
>sit down because oh god
>search pocket for change

>>33073435
>>inspect new item
Weird mysteriously appearing thing before beer. Not that beer would help us much.

>>33073435
>>search pocket for change
After this ordeal, what you need is a drink.

>>33073435
What kind currency does a dream vending machine even take? We should check that first before we start looking for nickles.

>>33073435
>search pocket for change
then
>sit down because oh god

We need a drink, we fucking need a drink like a drowning man needs air. If we have change we're getting beer, and then we're sitting the fuck down and chugging that motherfucker while hoping nothing horrible happens until we get nice warm buzz going.

>>33073545
I would say that because this is our dream, it takes whatever currency we have. And we have currency ebcause we say so.

Next we just need to convince the stuff trying to kill us that we're in control of this dream.........

>>33073572
this

>>33073572
And if someone interrupts our beer session we'll go full-on Shining on their ass(es). Because all the work and no play makes MC a dull girl.

(I won't say Madotsuki because I don't think we're Madotsuki. I'm not even sure we're a she.)

>>33073435

>BEER OPTION

>>33073687
We've been called "iron man" by 2 different entities so far. Take of that what you will.

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>>33073572
>>33073545
>>33073509
>>33073489

Learning New Things is easier when sitting down with a drink in you, you figure.

Why? Because fuck you, that's why, quibbling little inner voice. Where were you ten minutes ago? Why weren't you screaming "fuck the silver domes and Catholic zombies, run like a bitch?" Because you're a bitch.

Also

god

who cares.

You stumble up to the vending machine and give it a once-over. It says "beer," it has buttons, there's a slot, inspection over "gimme beer," you sigh and stab at a button at random.

The machine whirrs politely, and whamslamCLUNK!s something into the receptacle.

You pull it out, the cold can chilly even against your soaked skin. Hefting it, appreciating the liquidy full-ness of it, you turn it for inspection underneath the lamp-post.

Lemon Lime.

>>33073687
This has had increasingly little to do with Yume Nikki.

>>33073746
FUCK

>>33073746
Grab own boobs. Because we seem to have gender identity crisis in addition to forgetting our own name.

>>33073746
>Lemon Lime

Seriously!? FUCK THIS PLACE, FUCK IT RIGHT IN THE FUCKHOLE, FUCK IT WITH A SPIKED DILDO COVERED IN RUSTY RAZORWIRE! SERIOULY, WHAT THE FUCKING HELL KIND OF BULLSHIT IS THIS!?

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>>33073746

You regard the can woodenly, and from deep within you rips loose the saddest sigh ever expelled by mortal man.

Here you are, neck-deep in your fucked-up Id, with the Greater North-Eastern Eye-Wing Butterfly and Ned the Ded Catholic, and the piece de resistance is *this* shit.

"When I wake up, I am going to kill myself," you promise.

"I know," a sizzling voice replies.

You turn around, can in one hand and tools in the other, to see a demon with an umberella looking you in the eye.

Everything goes white.

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>>33073750

I agree.

Hilarious timing, btw.

>>33073746
Oh, we're Gunther Herman. Now everything makes sense. This is all just a dying hallucination caused by Laputan Machine.

>>33073873
i rather the mc be female , similar to madosuki

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>>33073840

Your skull explodes across the vast dark world, rolling away with a peal of Olympic fury. The eerie buzz of cicadas has been silenced and the drumbeat of the rain quelled; in the wake of the vanishing thunderclap is only EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

You're lost in a billowing white cloud, raindrops wet and heavy as they batter into your dry clothes. The mists swirl and part, and through the veil is revealed -

- a girl.

She stands beneath a pink umbrella that shades her face from the sallow lamplight, her pink sweater bizarrely simple and cheerful in the gloom. Her hollow eyes seem to stare through you, only now focusing and taking stock, processing your (continued) existence with bored, exasperated annoyance.

As the last echoes of the thunderclap roll away into the starless sky your brain catches up to your senses.


>"Why."
>"YOU LITTLE-"
>"PISS OFF, MY ID"

>>33074045
>"Why."
Oh god. Are we not the dreamer?

>>33074045
>>"Why."
WHYYYYYYYYYYYY!?
And let's be careful, she might have a knife.

>>33074045
>"Why."
Too fucking confused to do anything but wonder at what the hell's going on.

>>33074086
No anon, you are the dream.
And then the girl woke up.

>>33074045
So she's not mute here?

in that case, start the interrogations

>>33074186
Another observation- she was using two effects at the same time.
bikeknife
Be very, very afraid.

>>33074214
So are we.

Also this just occurred to me: Do we have any good memories associated with our Effects? This could end badly if we do, possibly even worse if we don't.

>>33074285
What effects do we have? Axe could count as one, I guess. What's the other one? Soda?

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>>33074131
>>33074126
>>33074086

You stare uncomprehendingly at the only completely normal creature you've seen since this nightmare began -

- who just transformed into a demon and struck you with lightning -

- the only remotely normal being you've met thus far, and scrape up just enough energy for the only query worth a damn.

"Why."

She blinks, very slowly, then opens her eyes and gapes wide-eyed at your continued presence.

"Why."

Her eyes spread saucer-wide, bloodshot whites barely containing dark, quivering pupils.

You find your can of Lemon-Lime on the ground beside you - you're on your ass, back to the vending machine. Scooping it up, you crack the top and chug half of it in one go.

"I swear to god if you start in with that iron man involved bullshit I'm going to break my foot off in your ass," you snarl, and chug the rest of the can (god you were thirsty its so sweet and cool going down) and fling the crumpled-up remnant in her general direction. "Why. Demon? Lightning? Girl? Fuck you." You wipe a hand over your face, sighing as the rain continues to soak your newly-dried clothing. "I give up. Can't make heads or tails of this. Finish me off, I don't give a shit."

She lowers the umbrella, half-closing it, and drops it. It splashes in a puddle and silence ripples forth as the rain vanishes in all directions, droplets banished from midair as the weak little sound propagates.

Silence, almost, but for the breathing, your breathing, two warm bodies in a dead, wet hell.

And then the fucking cunt pulls out a knife.

>meh
>hey. hey, hey, heeey, heeeeey
>god dammit I'mma do it see if I don't fucking do it ya boitch

>>33074318
Crowbar, for starters.

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>>33074318

In the first thread you climbed a power pole in the Barracks and salvaged one of these.

>>33074318
>>33074285
I wasn't thinking of our belongings as effects, more of a regular inventory. Nothing so far has proven to have magical powers, like Mado's tend to have.

Maybe... The insulator?

>>33074366
One of Mado's was just a knife. One's just a bike. We've found fairly mundane effects so far, but that doesn't change that "effects" and "Inventory" are synonyms here.

>>33074324
>god dammit I'mma do it see if I don't fucking do it ya boitch

>>33074324
>meh
Fuck it all, compared to everything else in this hell hole, being knifed by some girl is downright normal.

>>33074324
>>hey. hey, hey, heeey, heeeeey
Do you have to take everything so literally? Dann our ID is a right bitch.

>>33074324
Wait for her to get closer to see if she's actually gonna do it. If she actually does get into hitting range, axe her a question. We have the advantage of range.

>hey. hey, hey, heeey, heeeeey
Does every conversation we have turn to violence? Look, we aren't going to run screaming from you. That makes us a unique NPC. You want to see what unique NPCs do, don't you? So killing us would be a bad idea. You'll cut yourself off from content.

>>33074343
I guess. We haven't used it for anything yet, though, so I wasn't really thinking of it in those terms.

>>33074355
Does "telephone wire insulator" really count as an effect? That's more of a curio.

>>33074324

>god dammit I'mma do it see if I don't fucking do it ya boitch

Screw you, crazy girl!

>>33074324
Hay hat haaaay

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>>33074471
>>33074424
>>33074419
>>33074391
>>33074366
>theme: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WZWLb5IbVVA

You eyeball the wild-eyed girl gripping the long wicked kitchen knife in a double-handed grip as she takes a step towards you, panting with obvious panic. She leans forward slightly as her courage builds, and then she rushes forward, knife tucked low and close against her body, ready for the thrust -

- until you kick her legs out from under her and send her sprawling sideways into the wet grass. She lands with a loud, high-pitched yelp, the knife flying from her grasp. She rolls onto her back and scrabbles away from you on all fours, gasping with fright.

You narrow your eyes at her, thrust your palm forward, and say "HOW."

"huuuhuhuhuuuuu!" she wails incoherently.

You thump your chest. "Big Chief Thump'em Make Picture Talk."

She stops moving and stares at you blankly.

You point at her, then point at your leg, and do your best to emulate walking over to her and breaking your leg off in her ass by walking your fingers along the ground and pantomiming the requisite maneuvers.

"You're f-f-fucking nuts," she stammers.

>don't even dignify that with a response
>so you CAN talk!
>Hello you're bitch and I'm amnesiac charmed to meet you now onto the pressing business of WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON

>>33074666
I don't like any of those responses so I'm writing my own in:
>No fucking shit, I'm nuts. Eeverything here is nuts!

>>33074666
>>Hello you're bitch and I'm amnesiac charmed to meet you now onto the pressing business of WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON
We're already off to a good start with her, let's keep it on.

>>33074727
Second.

>>33074666
>Hello you're bitch and I'm amnesiac charmed to meet you now onto the pressing business of WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON

>>33074666
>so you CAN talk!
"I'm crazy? You're the one who struck me with lightning demon magic and then rushed me with a knife. But hey, at least you can talk rationally. That's better than most of the people here. Last guy I met who understood human speech was some sort of organic water pump. Everyone else has just screamed 'Iron Man!' at me. You have any idea what that's supposed to mean?"

>>33074782
And let's not forget Ted the Restless Dead, whom we apparently should know.

>>33074666
>Hello you're bitch and I'm amnesiac charmed to meet you now onto the pressing business of WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON

Maybe not those exact words, but I would like to get this quest started proper.

By the way, if the insulator really was an effect, jack shit did it do to help against the lightning attack. Maybe it needed to be activated first?

And who is fully involved? What makes me the Iron Man?

>>33074891
And what about probey?

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She made words, you marvel.

That made sense, even.

"Ah, chahm'ed, chahm'ed," you say with a horrific faux British affectation as you tip your imaginary hat, "Miss Bitch, I presume? I am Lord Amnesiac. If I might be so bold may I inquire as to what the HELL is going on!?"

"You're... real," she breathes, eyes wide.

"Nooo, I'm a hologram!" you chirp happily. "Lifelike, huh?"

The girl lurches forward onto all fours and begins crawling towards you, her eyes wide, but her mouth quirking with annoyance.

"So yeah, back to the whole matter of what the hell is going on-" you start, before noting that she's kind of close.

And crawling closer.

Brows furrowed with anger now, mouth snarled up in a knot as she advances on you like a stalking puma.

"Uh-"

She clamors over your legs, sitting on your thighs and grabbing your face in both hands, her hard, angry eyes only inches from yours.

"Uuhhh," you manage, a billion wild theories racing through your thoughts as she hatefucks you with her eyes from five inches away, staring into your soul with such intense, searing attention that you feel your heart begin to race even as your stomach sinks with fear.

She leans in, eyes afire, and pinches your cheeks really fucking hard.

>>33074945
>>33074891
>>33074828
>>33074782
>anon actually thinking about clues

Holy shit I love you guys. By the end of this thread at least you'll have one clue that's pretty non-ambiguous. I'm surprised someone of the right profession hasn't tripped over this thread and cottoned to it already, actually.

>>33074891

Its a passive effect - without it, you would've been fried chicken. As is, it only stunned you for a moment and flash-boiled the water out of your clothes (which didn't hurt you either.) You are truly Insulated.

>>33075070
>right profession
An undertaker?

>>33075070
Wondering about the thirteen graves. Just how many dead people do we knoe?

>>33075022
lean in and steal a kiss, then recite the fear line from dune

>>33075070
So what you're telling me is that this girl sees us minding our own fucking business while we try to get a drink, and she tries to kill us? And damn near succeeded if not for the stroke of dumb fucking luck that we had an insulator? Jesus Christ, at least we don't swing our axe at shit until actually aggresses us.

>>33075140
One.

ITS US

>>33075070
I feel like I'm almost getting it, but the fact that we're dealing with Madotsuki's weird psychomorphic imagery at the same time as ours is throwing me off.

>>33075171
You'd be doing that too, if you were in her shoes. Trust me, lightning and knifing is an appropriate response to almost everything when you're playing Yume Nikki.

>>33075191
What is this, a room for a-
>>33075221
clever

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>>33075022

BEEP BEEP BEEP

BEEP BEEP BEEP

Its dark EEP BEEP BE and warEP Bm and you're breathing easy in a EEP BEEPcocoon of snug clBEEP BEEP BEEoth and if you could open your eyes, you'd see the ceiling, and that's the impP BEEortant thing but you saw it a moment ago a
n
d

th

at
s
fi

n


e
tags are hard

>>33075205
Even things that seem to speak coherent sentences? Because she heard us saying "When I wake up, I'm going to kill myself" and she actually replied "I know" before throwing a lightning bolt at our face. Is this like an actual normal course of events? "Hi, how do you do?" *FUCKING LIGHTNINGBOLT*

>>33075262
Control +s

>>33075262
WAKE UP ITS EIGHT O CLOCK

>>33075283
HOLY FUCK I'M LATE FOR WORK

>>33075262
I wonder what this place we keep up waking in is. It doesn't seem our waking disposition is especially cheerful either.

I don't know whether to thank her for waking us the fuck up or condemn her for all eternity for not providing answers first.

One thing's for sure now, we're not an NPC, and we either just witnessed a shared dream (astral projection?) or Madotsuki is our version of LSD's Grey Man (an anthropomorphization of the brain's mechanism responsible for forgetting dreams).

I'm more worried of what it is that we keep waking up to.
Why would the alarm clock be going off again? Was that a snooze alarm? Don't those go off, like, every 5 minutes? Sure as hell felt like longer than that in the dream. Then again, it is normal for perception of time to distort when dreaming.

>>33075271
It's a bit of a reach, but it's not entirely implausible. The response of "I know" to "When I wake up I'm going to kill myself" thing could have been her thinking about she herself is going to kill herself, since that happens in the ending. She probably thought we were just one of the weird dreamworld constructs reflecting her own thoughts. And the things we said afterwards weren't that coherent without the context of what we'd been through, so she probably thought we were just going berserk. Also, not all characters in Yume Nikki die when you stab them with the knife. Sometimes they do other things. So she's a bit desensitized to violence.

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>>33075262

You wake up on the bench.

Blinking the (alertness?) from your eyes you see the Pink Punk kneeling in front of the vending machine, just now rising to her feet. Springing from your perch, you lunge at her and wind up a good, hefty kick right in the ASS.

"YEAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!" she shrieks, the piercing note of pain and surprise soaking into the sopping wet forest nightmare. She spins like a dervish, skirt flying outward and presses up against the vending machine, complete and utter shock in her eyes.

"GOOOOOOD MOOOOORNING, VEEEEE-IT-NAAAAHM," you cry, and shake your foot at her. "In your ass. Your ASS. I swear to god."

"y-you're rr-real," she stammers. "Oh god." She clasps her hands to her face and slides down the vending machine, her small frame shaking like a leaf.

You frown and cross your arms, confused and lost (again.) Now that you're dry, and "safe" and nothing neon-colored is trying to take a chunk out of your ass, you notice it.

Something's amiss with all of this.

>For the first time, I feel safe.
>Nothing here makes sense at all, and that doesn't fit.

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>>33075278

oh my god I'm a retard

>>33075389
>For the first time, I feel safe.
>hug her and refuse to let go

>>33075389
>>Nothing here makes sense at all, and that doesn't fit.
I'm not feeling particularly safe with that knife-wielding little psycho.

>>33075389
>Nothing here makes sense at all, and that doesn't fit.
Specifically, she doesn't fit. She makes sense. A horrible, crazy sense, but we've been going a little crazy too. She's not acting like a dream, she's acting like another person trapped in a dream. Like us.

>>33075389
>Nothing makes sense
"Every fucking thing I've seen here has been one gigantic clusterfuck after another, but at the very least there's been some halfway rational chain of things that gets there.

But this? this makes no sense. It's so irrational I'd have thought it was rational, but it's not. Something should be connecting this."

pause

"...and who're you, exactly?"

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>>33075389
YES. this is EXACTLY what I suspected.
She thought she was helping by waking us up.
I assume we disappeared for a minute or so from her perspective.

First, let's chill out with the histrionics a bit and get serious. She's obviously freaked out by our behavior.
We explain what's happening to us to see if she's the same way.

>waifucoats

>>33075389
>For the first time, I feel safe.

The way she's shaking and crying(?), it's like it just hit her that for the first time she actually almost killed somebody. We're an actual somebody, a real person, and she tried to kill us, twice.

>>33075491
That's an S actually, so it is waistcoats.

>>33075389
>Nothing here makes sense at all, and that doesn't fit.

"So what, you're NOT real? Who and what are you girl, and what the hell do you think just happened? Because all of thirty seconds ago I was lying in a cold, dark, very REAL room.

>>33075491
waistcoats, dude. back in the 18th century people sometimes wrote s like we write f.

>>33075070
>>33075107
>right profession
Probably a psychiatrist if I had to guess. I however am just an accountant, so my input will not be of much help, I'm afraid.

>>33075491
Also, seconding >>33075510

>>33075533
That's one screwed up S.

>>33075554
I believe it made it easier for early printing presses to produce the shape without smudging.

I have no idea whats going on

>>33075545
I'm pretty sure we don't remember the room while in... here.

>>33075596
At the end of the thread I'm expecting a recap session. God knows we need it.

>>33075572
Acknowledged.

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>theme: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSH7J9RAHm8&list=PL593E089566E242B9&index=2

You rummage in your pocket and produce the insulator. Tossing it to feel its heavy, cold heft, you ponder the confusion you felt when you first found it. Telephone poles without cables - just symbolism of civilization; a prop your subconscious threw in with the huts to fill out the needle-head town.

So why insulators? Why that detail? Too much like tripping over something.... real, rather than a fantasy that twisted and danced from your Id. Everything you've seen in these various worlds is consistent, but utterly alien to you.

How could your own subconcious, your own dark Id, be so completely alien?

... it couldn't.

"None of this is mine," you state suddenly. "None of this is *me.*"

"No," the girl whispers from where she huddles against the base of the vending machine. "This is my dream. And you're in it."

You step closer and sit in front of her, crossing your legs indian-style. "How? Why?"

She stares into a puddle on the ground, her dark, hollow eyes wide and wild, arms wrapped around her middle.

"I don't know."

Her gaze crawls up your body, truly seeing you for the first time, and you're taken aback by the intensity of her glare.

"You should know. You should wake up. Why did you go back to sleep? Why don't you get the hell OUT of here?"

"Because my alarm clock sucks," you reply.

Her mouth drops open.

"whu?"

Huh. Anyone know iron man in a context other than the song, superhero, triathlon event, or general meaning as a person or feat of great endurance?

>>33075791
I kind of took it to mean that last one.

>>33075791
stalin was refered to as the man of steel

>>33075791
I suppose it could be taken literally. We're actually a robot.
But seriously, I'm leaning against your latter.

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>>33075630

"I heard it beeping," you clarify. "Fell back asleep. Guess I'll be late for work." You consider that. "In fact, I'm going to call in, wherever it is."

"How did you get here?" she asks abruptly. "How - how?"

"You mean here -" you wave at the dark forest around you - "or here in la-la land?"

"Here," she says, slapping her hand into the earth. "Deep Forest. Tell me everything."

"Yeah. Want to get off the damn ground, first? My ass is freezing."

She nods, and you stand, extending your hand. She regards it warily for a moment, then takes it. Her hand is small and warm and very, tangibly real, and you sling her slender frame to her feet without effort. Taking a seat on the little bench, you lean forward, elbows on knees, and start at the beginning.

Waking in the darkness of an endless void. Stumbling over The Axe. Led to the exit by the Following Ghost. Emerging into a cursed wasteland of twisted plants and a false sky. The landscape littered with stone cubes with faces - that scream, that bleed. The screaming of techno-God, the neon insanity scrawled large across the dome of a false heaven as more cubes came raining down. Cube-Tron, the monster. The Barracks of purple huts and needle-headed ghosts. And then the bird-men, the beeping, accusing bird men who called you -

"They TALKED!?" she cries, hands clutched to her breast apprehensively.

"Wouldn't shut up," you sigh, rubbing your head. "Called me probie, called me Iron Man, and then they tried to rip me up. Why, what do they call you?"

"Nothing," she insists. "Nothing. They never talk. NOTHING talks, not here, not in my dreams."

"Maybe because you shank them all, first?"

She shakes her head. "The Toriningen? You can't beat them. They catch you, you've got to wake up. You can only run."

>>33075630
make her our waifu

>>33075836
Well, Good Morning Vietnam is a movie. Perhaps we're in the entertainment industry?

If the detail is actually from us and this isn't just a shared dreamscape, perhaps the detail of the insulators implies we're an electrician?

>>33075791
The song is kind of really creepy. It tells the story of a man who travels back in time in order to save the world from this one-man apocalypse that is the Iron Man. But something goes wrong, and when he appears in the past, he's turned into a metal statue, frozen in place but fully aware. People marvel about him, but nobody tries to help him, he becomes a strange curiosity. So the world passes around him while he slowly goes completely insane, until he eventually regains his ability to move, at which point he wants revenge upon the uncaring world, and so Iron Man begins the apocalypse.

Given how fucked up this dreamscape is, a vague reference to the song doesn't seem unlikely.

>>33075865
pls don't do this

>>33075791
Unless the man's literally made out of iron, I've got nothing off the top of my head. I mean, you could probably look into the symbolic meaning of the phrase, or even into mythological figures associated with iron, but that's kind of stretching it a bit don't you think?

Anyway, seems like we're in HER dream. Well, what happens when she wakes up? Would we still be stuck in the dream? Would we die? I get the feeling that "she wakes up and so do we" is just too easy.

>>33075852
... is our subconscious starting to bleed into her dream world? Because forgive me for referencing Inception, but if our dead with starts to appear and wreck our shit I think we're pretty much screwed.

>>33075935
I meant to say 'dead wife'. Seriously, though, I'm just glad we can still distinguish fantasy from reality at this point. The moment things start to get 'normalized' is the point when we're well and truly boned.

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>>33075852

"I ran," you confirm. "Ran like my ass was on fire. Met Master Stream."

She quirks her eyes at you. "Who?"

"Straw-head fellow? Hangs out in a bathhouse-"

"Onsen-san."

"He said he was-"

"He SAID?"

"Yes!" you state.

She looks troubled. "Talking... that's new. But so's... the cube-monster. And the ghost. And the axe." She points at your weapon, lying forgotten by the vending machine. "I found the knife in the same place you found that." She huddles up on the bench again, drawing her legs off the ground and tucking them besides her. "That's your dream... I think."

"Mas- uh, onsen-san called me Iron Man. Just like the bird people-"

"-Toriningen-"

"-whatever. And they both kept telling me 'its fully involved,' whatever the hell that means." You pause. "You know what the hell that means?"

She quirks her mouth, and shakes her head.

"Great."

A silence stretches between you, cold and conspicuous.

>what say

Maybe Iron in 'iron man' is meant to be a grounding point. and man is just our gender

>>33075918
Did they ever spell out the reason he went back? I thought he just did it "for the future of mankind".

Apparently "probie" is a term for someone on their probationary period. It essentially means newbie. Among other professions, it's used by firefighters, which may explain the ax.

>>33075993
Explore!

>>33075993
Show me your cooter

>>33075852
They may not talk in the game, but they talk in the manga.

>>33075993
>So mind filling the blanks?

>>33075935
A philosophical problem has arisen. How can she prove to us we're in her dream, and how could we prove that she's in ours, without also meeting in real life?

>>33075993
>Can i have your umbrella?

>>33076024
It's not spelled out, but the implication is he did it to save humanity from Iron Man, then the time-travelling magnetic field turns him into Iron Man.

>>33075993
"It sounds like you come here every time you dream, and it's never been anything other than a nightmare. And my own experiences so far haven't been that great, either. So how about we stick together? That way, no matter what horrible things happen, we'll at least have someone here who isn't insane. Someone who's an actual person we can talk to and not have to fear. That sound good to you?"

>>33076096
No, there's not really any implication at all. Him being the problem he went back to fix certainly makes SENSE, but there's nothing to even suggest it's the case.

>>33075993
We should finish our story! Tell her about the train, the silent dark figure, the man-eye-butterflies, the silver domes, and the screaming corpse-catholic.

>>33076148
We should get her story. She's obviously been here long enough to name everything.

>>33075993
Well shit.

Hey, you ever saw an area with 13 graves? Crinkly, like space wrap, and the catholic zombie?

Also, the Following Ghost talked, too.

>>33075865
Fuck you nigger she's My waifu and I'm not sharing.

>>33076145
It always seemed obvious to me, and to other people I've talked to. Hell the wikipedia article on the song also takes that interpretation. I mean, yeah there's nothing I can point to in the song and say that proves it, but taken as a whole it just seems self-evident.

>>33076084
It's entirely possible that we're merely having our minds connect with some sort of third party, a 'canvas' upon which our subconscious paints a picture. It's not entirely impossible that Yume Nikki wasn't like that, only in the game there was but one 'user/contributor/dreamer' and now there are two... or possibly more.

>>33075993
"Look, sitting on this bench is nice and all, but it's not getting us anywhere. I say we stick together, at least until we find someplace safe... if someplace like that even exists in this crazy dreamworld." (stand up) "Don't give me a reason to boot you in the arse again, and I think we'll be just fine."

>>33076145
Well, the line "Vengeance from the grave/ Kills the people he once saved" does imply a duality that he's both the destroyer and the savior. And the connection of "Iron Man lives again" to the description of everyone running in fear suggests this isn't the first time the Iron Man has caused destruction. I agree that it's ambiguous, and could just be referring to him rising from his paralyzed state to resume living. But I like the predestination paradox interpretation.

>>33076238
Same problem still exists, though. How to prove not just a dream.

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You contemplate several inane queries to break the silence, growing increasingly uncomfortable with the silence here because Jesus Christ on a pogo stick, its easy to forget how *wrong* this place is when you're talking with a real live human. You look around, nervous, and your hands long for the axe and the iron -

" - why do you have a cross on your head?" she asks.

"... what?"

"A cross, on your head. In ash, I think."

"... what, like Palm Sunday?" you say, confused. "Oh, that's..." you finish your tale, explaining how you drank from the pool Master Stream (or onsen-san) indicated, how you woke in the lake, rode the electric tram with the Black-Headed Man, and your fight and flight from the man-sized butterflies with eyes in their wings.

And then -

- the moon.

- the burnt gulch.

Thirteen silver barrows, and the man you should know, but couldn't remember, who reached out from death to cross your forehead with ash, there in the ravine, the dark, lost ravine-

"Do you have it?" she asks, shaking you gently. You start violently, your thoughts fleeing back to the little bubble of lamplight.

"What?"

"Whatever he gave you."

You dig into your pocket and find the little circle of stitched fabric.

>>33076255
look, for now, there's just three possibilities. We're in her dream, she's in ours, or it's shared. Safest bet is to assume the latter.

Either case, we might be the key to helping Madotsuki understand more about this dreamworld, since creatures actually talk to us, but not her.

>>33076243
I always assumed it was the latter. Plus, if it's a temporal thing wouldn't it be the first time Iron Man is killing people? That's not to say it isn't a cool as hell interpretation, though.

>>33076295
>Mann Gulch Fire[edit]
>The largest disaster involving smokejumper deaths on the job was the Mann Gulch fire blowup of 1949 which occurred north of Helena, Montana at the Gates of the Mountains area along the Missouri River. Thirteen firefighters died during the blowup, 12 of them jumpers. This disaster directly led to the establishment of modern safety standards used by all wildland firefighters. Noted author Norman MacLean, described the incident in Young Men and Fire (1992).

Well THIS isn't from Madotsuki's dream.

>>33076295
Okay, the guy upthread was right. Probationary wildfire fighter. Fits the axe and the ash. And aren't silvered Mylar bubbles like the ones we found at the graves used to protect things from heat?

>>33076295
Ohhh. Google-sensei says a smokejumper is basically a parafirefighter who jumps out of planes to help combat wildfires.

>>33076336
And now that I think about it, when we asked how the axe was joined to the crowbar, the example picture was a Pullman tool, something made explicitly because firefighters were having difficulty having to carry both an axe and a crowbar. Oh, this was foreshadowed pretty well. I like this. It's great when everything you've seen all falls into place after you've had one critical bit explained.

>>33076367
>>33076336
>>33076334
Found an interesting news story linking firefighters and ironman competitions. Maybe we did something similar? I think our status as a fireman (past or present) is all but confirmed.

http://host.madison.com/news/local/madison-firefighter-competes-in-ironman-races-wearing-full-fire-gear/article_12f2eeea-f3a9-11e1-9071-0019bb2963f4.html

It just occurred to me, isn't Mado japanese? How come she's speaking english?
And don't tell me she would reply "Funny, I was just wondering how you were speaking japanese so well despite being american"

>>33076334
>>33076336
>>33076367
>>33076403
>>33076410


Faggot, you magnificent bastard, all the clues were right there from the fucking start and only now we're seeing them.

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>>33076295

You both stare at it, puzzled. You can't remember what it means any more than you can remember your own name, or what job your beeping alarm was summoning you to, but the ragged little patch feels familiar, somehow. You trace your fingertips over the raised stitching and cloth decals. It makes you feel better, somehow, just to hold it.

"Keep it," she says at last. "It might do something."

"What?"

"How did you survive that lightning bolt?"

"How did you throw it?" you counter.

"Exactly," she says. "Things... that you pick up, or find, or are given to you... they do things here. Some of them are just stuff you couldn't get otherwise - like the knife, or the axe - and others... do stuff."

"Uh," you say, rubbing your thumb over the faded patch. "So what are you doing here, talking to Mister Dream invader? If you woke up, I couldn't keep haunting your dream, right? I could piss of to my own dream where everything isn't trying to take a chunk out of my ass." You poke her cheek experimentally -

- and stars explode across your vision as she slaps your chops with every once of strength she can muster.

"NO!" she screams in terror. "YOU CAN'T! YOU CAN'T!" She's off the bench and past the vending machine, just barely in the light of the lamp, the knife gleaming in her hand again. You didn't even see her move. "You CAN'T!"

>>33076403
Shit, I mean Halligan tool. Got the name wrong. Not sure how I did that.

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>>33076470
A stiched circle! It's a patch! A firefighter patch!

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>>33076470
>or what job your beeping alarm was summoning you to
What if it's a Smoke Detector, and not a beeping alarm?

>>33076470
MC, wtf are you doing? MC, stop that!

>Thirteen crosses were erected to mark the locations where the thirteen firefighters who died fighting the Mann Gulch Fire fell
>Thirteen crosses
Hmm.
>one of the smokejumpers who died in the Mann Gulch Fire was David Navon, who was Jewish.
>Jewish
/pol/ was right again!

>>33076334
>Mann Gulch Fire at the Gates of the Mountains area along the Missouri River
>"Night and day the dark gates stand wide..."

Jesus fucking Christ

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>>33076447
>>33076403

best readers

The halligan tool(or crowbar or whatever) and axe combo is commonly called the Irons, and the man who carries them...

... he also has a very specific job.

>>33076539
Could be both. The alarm down at the station alerting the firefighters to there being a blaze. And by not waking up we're letting people burn.

>>33076539

VERY WARM, ALMOST THERE

you are in fact lying down on the job

>>33076528
... look at the picture

>>33076580
Aw shit

>>33076539
... oh crap. How did I not think of that? We are in SERIOUS TROUBLE.

Seriously, how did NO ONE ELSE think of that?

>>33076597
We're ded of smoke inhalation?

>>33076539

The MC is a firefighter having a near death experience while he's asleep and his house is on fire
>>33076597
the MC passed out because of the smoke after making a Smoke jumper jump out of a plane and is having a near death experience

>>33076597
This is our dying dream

>>33076574
He gets people out of places. He opens windows and doors and lets people caught by fire leave. And Madotsuki is trapped in her apartment. Is that why we're here with her? Is she going to burn?

>>33076660
The Halligan tool is also used to shut down gas mains. Maybe the reason Madotsuki's having these awful dreams and eventually kills herself is something as simple as a gas leak in her apartment?

>>33076597
Hospital heartbeat thingy?

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>>33076597
Aw shit it's a Fire Alarm

But what's the deal with the shattering dome?

And who is Involved?
What does it mean to be Involved?

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>>33076470

"Woah woah, woah," you say, patting the air. "Woah."

"I'M NOT A PONY!"

"You might be a big fan of your Id but, sweetie, you need to lay off the acid, okay? Because, seriously, fuck this place, I want out."

"I can't," she stammers. "I can't wake up. Not yet."

You look around you at the Dark Forest, or whatever she called it, and nod sagely. "Yep, yer fucking bent."

"Its not that!" she cries, swiping the knife through the air angrily. "I've got to do something here, and its my last chance. Tonight."

"Why?"

"What's your name?"

You chew some air for a second before deciding on "Fredrick Y. 'Ouself," but she cuts you off before you can get pissy. "Exactly. I can't remember either, down here. And I've been down here a lot, trust me. But I know its my last chance, tonight, and if I wake up tonight, I won't be sleeping again."

"So if I want you to wake up and let me off Miss Pinko's Psychedelic Ride-"

"Help me," she quavers, wide eyes staring into yours.

>>33076604
Mainsfield Fire Department

>what's beeping?
>fully involved?

You're all tantalizingly close and once you catch on you're going to shit a brick.

Remember what Master Stream said.

>>33076755
>Fully involved: Term of size-up meaning fire, heat and smoke in a structure are so widespread that internal access must wait until fire streams can be applied.

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>>33076755
Onsen-san is a hand pump isn't he.

>>33076755
What did he say? I wasn't there.

>>33076716
I'm pretty sure it's my job to help people. What can I do for you?

>>33076755
>"Iron Man," the creature says. "It is fully involved. I cannot help you any further. You must find your own way out."

>"Doooo nooooooot faaaaaaaaaiiillllll," Master Streams voice drones from a very, very long ways away. "Yoooooooooooooou aaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrreeeeeeeeeeeeeee......."

Those are the relevant passages.

>you must find your own way out

Theory: we're as trapped in this as she is. We have the occasional flickers back to the "real" world, but that's it.

>>33076836
>"I Am Master Stream," it says, its deep, onerous voice echoing around the big room. "Who are You?"
>"You Are Iron Man," it says in that same deep, hollow tone. "You are Friend."
>"Drink."
>It does, indeed, taste like club soda - carbonated, but with no flavor.
>"Iron Man," the creature says. "It is fully involved. I cannot help you any further. You must find your own way out."
>"Doooo nooooooot faaaaaaaaaiiillllll," Master Streams voice drones from a very, very long ways away. "Yoooooooooooooou aaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrreeeeeeeeeeeeeee......."

All right, we're a Fireman doorbreacher, and the fire's 0wn3d the building. Not good.

>>33076895

We had the irons, we were first into a burning building, the fire went completely out of control, it's fully involved, it means everything is on fucking fire. We fell unconscious due to smoke inhalation or something. That warm cocoon is our firefighting gear.

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>>33076716
>theme: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SLJllk-0o6c

Once you calm her down, she sits next to you, polishing her wicked-looking knife nervously against her skirt. "There's only four more things I need to get," she tells you. "Four more items... four more Effects."

"You know where to find them?"

She nods, studying her reflection in the polished knife blade. "The triangle kerchief. The Faceless Ghost. The Severed Head."

You nod, and wait, and sigh. "And?"

"I don't know," she admits. "I used to have all those things and now... I don't. Something went wrong, but-"

"-you can't remember."

She nods, and looks at you, clearly frightened. "I've been down here so often - I thought I'd suffered everything. Seen it all. Knew my way around, and now... I'm out of time, the Effects are missing, and I don't know what to do."

"But you know where to go?" you ask.

She hesitates, but nods.

You rise, crack your neck with a groan, and stride over to your axe and mated crowbar. Hefting it, you twirl it one-handed. You never noticed just how easily it fit in your hand, but you notice now. Walking back to the pink-clad girl, you slap her on the shoulder.

"Then lets go."

>>33076895
A fully involved fire is one so big you have to actually go inside it to extinguish it. We're the Iron Man, the one in charge of using the axe and bar to open any doors or windows to allow access. We got inside and then...we passed out. The beeping is an alert that our oxygen supply is running low. We're not in danger of burning, but we're running out of breathable air. Still not sure why Master Streams' water was club soda, though.

This some sort of little busters type shit where we're stuck right before the moment where we both die but we experience memory loss as we create a dream plane that makes time go really slow so we can figure out what to do or something?

>>33076933
Holy shit, a Master Stream is a firefighting thing. It appears to basically be a really big stream of water (which are categorically known as fire streams, as in >>33076822). Generally used when a fire has pretty much consumed a building.

>>33076962

And the beeping is your PASS device, yep.

>>33076989
Spray water through charcoal.
It gets carbonated.
What makes charcoal?
Protip: It's hot

>>33076989
Oxygen supply! That was the last fucking piece. The beeping is our oxygen supply running low. Yeah we're not in danger of burning, that's why it's a good sign that we can see the ceiling when we're awake. If we can see it, it means there's no smoke, and no smoke means there's probably no fire creeping up on us. At least not yet.

>>33076989
That is the exact opposite of what a fully involved fire is. It's a fire that's so big it's too dangerous to go in and try to rescue people before you spray water on it a lot from firehoses.

>>33076967
Well then, I guess we need to help Window on her fetch quest so we can wake up and NotDead.

>>33076989
Club soda is just carbonated water. Water and CO2...

Water puts out fires well, and compressed CO2 is the main component of commercial fire extinguishers.

Mother. Of. Shit.

>>33077061
Oh! PASS device, that makes more sense. That's the thing that activates if it doesn't detect you moving for 30 seconds, beeping to try and alert other firefighters to your position and state of incapacitation.

>>33077103
So it is. I misread that article. So maybe the fire became fully involved after we entered it, and that's why no one can rescue us?

>>33077148
Oh. Oh god damn it. I just got it. The Iron Man is the one in charge of opening Windows. That better not be the pun you're going for, OP.

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>>33076967

"W-wait," she says as she scrambles for her umbrella. "What should I call you?"

"Handsome, dashing, brilliant, brave, corageous, humble, modest, sexy, powerful, awe-inspiring-"

"Dickbutt," she snorts, kicking some sod at you.

"Okay, fine," you concede. "Uh... Iron Man just sounds stupid, though. How about, uh... what do I call you?"

"Here?" she says, looking down at herself. "Madotsuki."

"What, like that kebab thing?"

She rolls her eyes. "It means 'window'."

"What? That's weird."

"Says Iron Man over here."

You sigh, conceding the point. "Fine, call me..."

>what name?

>>33077165
Presumably. Also goddamn that pun

>>33077218
>what name?
Stark. Because why not?

>>33077218
>Hank
I got nothing.

>>33077218
Robert Stark

>>33077165
God damn it we have to open Madotsuki and, in-context, it's the LEAST lewd thing imaginable.

>>33077218
Robert

>>33077218
>what name?
Fuck it, call me Stark.

>>33077247
>>33077266
>>33077277
>>33077289
Robert Stark cool with all you guys?

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>>33077165
>The Iron Man is the one in charge of opening Windows. That better not be the pun you're going for, OP.

Oh god I lost it

As hilarious as that is, no, I didn't intend that at all, and if I did, I have friends with standing instructions to drive to my house and end my faggotry once and for all. With a wood chipper. We call it the Coleslaw protocol

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>>33077247
I'll back this.

>>33077165
>iron man opens windows
>madotsuki is japanese for window
God DAMMIT. Pic related though, that was masterfully set up.

>>33077305
Your ID is influencing your quests.

>>33077304
I prefer Stark Raving Mad, if it's all the same.

>>33077218
>dickbutt
DAMMIT COOLDOWN STOP RUINING EVERYTHING

>>33077304
yeah, that works

>>33077305
Good. Because Roger Zelazny is the only man who gets to base an entire story around telling a bad pun. Anyone else does that, they need to be hurt for it.

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>>33077304
>>33077289
>>33077277
>>33077266
>>33077260
>>33077247
>>33077222
>theme: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9nLe3PAm4Ro&index=3&list=PLU4ktq2pWONsZjNJfmbfMY4jAU3KyZ871

"... Stark," you decide.

She frowns and rubs her head. "Is that some sort of reference?"

"A better one than that stupid song, anyways."

You wait for her to shake off her umbrella and tuck it under her arm. "Right-o, Madotsuki. Where to?"

She looks up at the lamp, which burns without any buzz or any dancing moths to keep it company (don't dwell on it don't THINK about it-!) "First, we must traverse the Staircase of Hands. Then we enter the Underground World. From there, to the Mall..."

"... and then?"

"A bad place," she whispers. "We'll get there soon enough. Come."

You set off into the darkness behind your new guide, your tools slung over your shoulder. The cicadas have started up again and this time their song comes in pulses, regular and artificial and wrong, but to hell with them. You keep your eye on Madotsuki, her sensible little Mary Janes clopping flatly on the blacktop, the sound vanishing into the wet, breathing Forest.

Sound. You rub your thumb over the faded patch once more, thinking. That canyon was the first place you've heard an echo since you began this nightmare, you think. Everywhere and everything else has been too soft, too disgustingly *organic,* and hungry, soaking up sound and giving nothing back.

The hungry darkness closes in around Madotsuki up ahead, her pink sweater seeming to fade even as you look at it; even her reflection in the wet blacktop shimmering and dimming. You step quicker and catch up, keeping a few paces behind her, your hand firm and ready on the haft of your axe.

The darkness can fuck right off. Stark's on call today, he's got the tools, and he always, ALWAYS gets the job done.

You can't remember your name... but you do know that.

>>33077676
>bwuuuuuuuuuuuuuph
>bwuuuuuuuuuuuuuph
>So, what's your story?

>>33077676
Engage in awkward conversation!

>>33077676
Why do I want to hug Madotsuki, despite her being both A. a complete prick, and B. fictional?

>>33077902
Because she's a young girl in a bad situation and that's a natural response of human empathy? And she's not that much of a prick, she's just desperate to leave mixed with confusion over meeting someone else in here.

>>33077940
But

Well, OK then.

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>>33077676
>theme: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tku5ELCpruU&index=33&list=PLU4ktq2pWONsZjNJfmbfMY4jAU3KyZ871

The light continues to fade, only Madotsuki's pink shirt still visible in the gloom. Soon the darkness has closed in around you and only the moist air and dead clopping of her Mary Janes and sad squelching of your sneakers can be heard in the dark. Aside from the faint reflection of your shoes on the shiny wet blacktop, you're lost in the dark. Madotsuki forges ahead, unperturbed.

"Mado, where are we?" you say, low and tense.

"The Puddle World," she says. "Here." She reaches out, and light flares into existence overhead, making you duck - but its only another iron lamp-post. You look out into the dark, and see the light glinting off puddles and puddles, and puddles, dark rippling pools shimmering and rippling as far as the eye can see, fading into the distance beyond the lamp's bubble of light.

She leads you onward, her Mary Janes splish-splashing from puddle to puddle as she connects the dots till you espy another lamppost ahead, the wrought iron almost invisible in the gloom. She touches it and it flares to life, leaving a trail of luminance behind you as you traverse this strange, empty place.

"Anything live here?"

"Not a damn thing," she says. "This is where people die." She grins, and lunges at you with the knife.

>>33078038
Jesus Christ, WHAT NOW?!

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>>33078038

THAT'S A WRAP FOR TONIGHT, FOLKS, because I've got work in three hours and oh christ I'm going to beat a customer to death with their own arms by nine o'clock, I swear to god I need some rest. We will resume MONDAY, at 6PM EST (-5 GMT,) wherein we get to hunt down The Real Madotsuki in the Puddle World while evading her evil doppleganger that schlooped her up somehow.

On a scale of 1 to 2spooky, next thread ought to rate at "claymation," so don't plan anything Tuesday morning, m'kay

>>33078087
Oh, okay that makes sense. It's not Madotsuki, it's a weird puddle reflection come to life. I guess. This was fun and I really liked the part where we had the big reveal (well, a little reveal followed by us putting it all together, but whatever) Anyway, see you next time, faggot.

P.S:Maybe think about changing that name so I feel less bad about addressing you directly, please?

>>33078157

naw its cool totes I really am a faggot and I'm cool with it

>>33078200
Well, if you say so...

A cliffhanger, fuck you faggot, fuck you. This is good stuff though, real good stuff. My mind is all full of fuck and my dreams are going to be weird as shit, but still I want more. I need to play this Yume Nikki game at some point, it sounds dark, disturbing, and mindfucky, just the sort of things I hate to like.

>>33078157
Yeah, piecing all the stuff together was fucking awesome. I just love how faggot put the clues out there so that eventually we would piece it together and everything would make sense, it was an excellent lead-up with a great payoff.

>>33078247
the game will leave you suicidal and confused

>>33078325
Which is what I feel like every other day of my life. It's nice when I get to blame the feelings on something else.

Gotta say I'm not too fond of our AMURICA TO THE RESCUE HOORAAH MANLY MAN FIREFIGHTER-kun MC.

Some nice ideas here and there, but can't really enjoy the story too much, maybe YN is just too sacred for me so this feels just wrong.

>>33078702
That's not the feeling I got at all. The MC is scared and confused out of his mind and doesn't know what the hell's going on. He only sort of got his shit together on meeting Madotsuki, and frankly she seemed to have her shit together more than the MC does. At least she understands the place, whereas the MC is very much a stranger in a strange land.

Welp it's 9 in the morning already. Hope OP has the motivation to continue on schedule later.

Have a relaxing beat that gives off some Yume Nikki vibes, for me at least.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G_SKeV8TS5Y

>>33078247
Once you're done with Yume Nikki, try .flow and Ib. :^)

>>33079116
>.flow and lb
What are those?

Thanks op

>>33079414
Video games.

>>33081024
For the record:
http://dotflow.wikidot.com/downloads
http://vgperson.com/games/ib.htm

I'm a slowpoke, but I finally figured out what was going on with that ghost at the very start. With all the static? Someone was calling Stark over his radio just as things went to hell.

Basically, a burst of static, followed by someone going "What? OH SHIT!" and then "Involved! Get out! Involved!" Except by then, Stark was already konked out from heat/smoke inhalation' what have you.

You glorious bastard. This is the type of story telling that careful planning gets you.

>>33076732
Not that one. >>33076295